Reviews by MathBrush

This is a well-put-together twine game for the Neo Twiny Jam, written in 500 words or less.

In it, you play as someone who seems to have a crushing fear of injuring someone while driving. I understand this fear for sure; I'm a mediocre driver and zone out a lot, and have had close calls in the past, like almost getting sideswiped by a semi truck when I was in its blind spot.

This driver's fears are expressed through oblique references and through the use of color and a few other graphical techniques.

The game itself is tense, but the background is hard to define. Parental trauma lingers in the background, but there's something else going on that's hard to define and is left unsaid. Interesting game.

This Twine game entered in the Neo Twiny Jam is, like the others, under 500 words.

It uses a pleasing text effect where hovering over underlined words brings up a box with clarification, like words muttered under the breath or mental comments reviewing your own previous thoughts.

I at first thought this was just going to be some edgy stoner thing (as it starts with you passing a joint back and forth with a friend) but it's a lot more meaningful, with a deep science conversation about the sun and a link between that and the situation going on around you that is full of implication but not brought into the open.

The ending is powerful in its own way, but it didn't completely land for me, as I felt like it was slightly disconnected from the rest of the game. Kind of like a differentiable piecewise function that has a discontinuous second derivative; the transition is fairly smooth at the break point but something feels slightly off. But the writing is great, some of the best I've seen in the jam so far.

This is a short poem entered in the Neo Twiny Jam, coming in at slightly less than 400 words.

It is a poem of consisting of short, staccato sentences of roughly equal size, some using text effects such as blur or cycling links. It covers brother who is not there, a brother who the parents refuse or are unable to see.

It has several possible interpretations, between loss, a change in self-identity, or something sinister.

There are few choices, if any, but the links there are help to guide your own pace through the poem and split it up in good spots, so the interactivity worked for me.

This game has you, an ancient (I think) and powerful vampire, trapped on a roof, dying as morning breaks.

The author does a good job of evoking feeling. There is some minimal use of quickly timed text, which felt appropriate for the story. The character is portrayed with nuance, both bombastic and arrogant but also stoic and resigned.

There is some appropriate music setting the stage. It was brief, as intended for a Neo Twiny Jam game.

I identified with this a lot. It's a story about the agonies of feelings of inadequacy after childbirth. I remember that feeling after my son was born and knowing that every second of the rest of my life (at least for a decade or two) somebody had to be watching and taking care of him. I remember panicking when some numeric milestone wasn't reached like weight and I remember the first time he had a serious injury. The protagonist is hit even harder, though, as there seems to be very strong post-partum depression and/or anxiety, so it must be a truly rough experience. The author clearly loves the child but that doesn't make it easier; if you didn't love, didn't care, then things would be great, because you wouldn't have to stress about the kid. It's the love that allows the anxiety to take hold, which adds to the guilt. So it's all very relatable.

This Neo Twiny Jam game reminded me of the Magnus Archives in a good way.

You are a puppet made of the shell of a cyperus (which I think is a tigernut? after looking it up). You are forced to dance and dance, but unlike the other puppets, it brings you no joy.

This is framed in the art for the game as a trans story, which it makes sense as, but it also could extend to many things where the reader differs from others around them.

Overall, I found the writing evocative and poetic, which pulled the whole thing together for me.

This is a short game entered into the Neo Twiny Jam, made for games with 500 words or less.

This game features a creepy situation, where one of your classmates admits they constantly want to grope another classmate. In a twist, the would-be groper turns out to be (Spoiler - click to show)a girl. So I guess the moral of the story is that creepiness is not limited in its scope, but all can be disturbing and/or put on watchlists.

This game is entered in the Neo Twiny Jam, having less than 500 words.

It's an interesting game, a sequel to an idle game called Literally Watch Paint Dry that I'm in the middle of playing as I write this. It has some interesting plot twists about friends saying cruel things.

This game is split into two branches, one with a friend that is pretty kind; this branch is fairly bland. The other is with a 'friend' who hasn't been there for you since transitioning. This one is more poignant.

Overall, I feel the game made sense without knowledge of the idle game prequel. But both branches felt like they could use a little more 'seasoning', some more uniqueness in either phrasing or plot.

This is a well-made Twine game written in 500 words or less for the Neo Twiny Jam

Rather than attempting to fit a grand structure into that small space, the author has created a linear narrative that is frankly very amusing.

This linear narrative is enhanced by many little animated doodads which react to hovering or clicking. These are pretty cool, but they all seem to advance the story the same as each other; I think. That's the thing, I couldn't tell if they were different branches, little side effects that returned to the main thing, etc. So I liked the overall idea, but my brain didn't comprehend well.

There's something about a minimal twine or parser game about a cheeky bird that makes for a great story. There have been quite a few in recent years (like Free Bird or The Familiar or Among the Seasons), and this one is a great addition.

It's in a scrollable format, each choice you make adding to each another in a chain, reminiscent of Inklewriter. The words are minimal, which makes sense as it's entered in a jam for games with < 500 words. It uses this minimality to add 8 different endings, mostly in a branching time cave-type format.

Cute text styling and mild animations/timed effects add a lot of character. Very fun.